Listen to the Party or Be a Decent Human Being? Truly, You Can Only Choose One
Listen to the Party or Be a Decent Human Being? Truly, You Can Only Choose One
Have you ever heard of a high-ranking Communist Party official with over a hundred mistresses? I have, and after hearing about it, my biggest question was whether such a person was raised by his mother. If he was, I’d love to ask his mother—whether she’s alive or long gone—whether she’s proud of having such a son. Have you ever heard of a Communist Party judge ruling on a case of “awaiting prostitution”? I have, and my biggest question after hearing it was whether such a person has a wife (assuming it’s a man). If he does, I’d love to ask his wife—whether she’s normal or not—whether she accepts that him lying in bed waiting for her counts as “paying his dues.” Have you ever heard of a Communist Party police officer handling a rape case by saying “the resistance wasn’t obvious”? I have, and my biggest question afterward was whether such a person has children (again, assuming it’s a man). If he does, I’d love to ask him—whether his kids are grown or not—how he’d explain to them, once they’re adults, what “resistance wasn’t obvious” means.
Of course, no matter what, I’d never actually get the chance to ask these questions, nor do I really have the idle curiosity to pursue them. Because I understand that such inhuman acts are as common as dirt among the “outstanding talents” of the Communist Party—so many that you couldn’t possibly ask them all. So then the question becomes: why? Why can so many “people” behave this way?
Is it because the feng shui of this land is bad? I don’t think so—this land once had a truly brilliant civilization. Is it because the people of this land are inherently flawed? I don’t think so either—other places with the same ethnicity, not directly poisoned by the Communist Party, aren’t like this. Is it because this land has been poisoned? Yes, I think it has, and that poison is communism—or rather, the Communist Party that preaches it. This poison is incredibly toxic, and what’s especially unique about it is that it first poisons their so-called “own people,” the exemplary Communist Party members, before spreading to everything else. It’s a bit like “to master the divine skill, you must first castrate yourself.” If you don’t believe me, let me slowly explain why “listening to the Party and being a decent human being truly leaves you with only one choice.”
First, let’s talk about what it takes to be an exemplary Communist Party member: naturally, the top requirement is to “listen to the Party.” So what is “Party rhetoric,” and what are its characteristics? I think the ones most qualified to answer this are the standout representatives of the “patriotic thieves”—figures like Hu Xijin, Jin Canrong, Sima Nan, and Zhang Weiwei—because they love the Party so deeply. But precisely because they love it too much, they’ve lost their humanity, so their words aren’t worth listening to. Instead, let me, an outsider, give a rough summary. As an outsider, I can probably only boil it down to three points.
Point One: The Party’s Rhetoric Is Vast and Vague
To figure out how much Party rhetoric there is, you first need to determine what counts as Party rhetoric. Does the Party Constitution count? It absolutely does. I don’t know how many words or sentences are in a single Party Constitution, but I do know it’s been revised many times—probably once every few years. If you tallied up all the words from every version, even after removing duplicates, it’d still be a lot, right? Do the words of Party leaders at all levels count? I think they should too—at least the words of top leaders in higher-level Party organizations should count as Party rhetoric. How many people does that include? How many words? Even if you trimmed out the miscellaneous stuff, it wouldn’t be less than all the Party Constitutions combined—probably a vast ocean of words. And what about the words of those “patriotic thief” representatives like Hu Xijin, Jin Canrong, Sima Nan, and Zhang Weiwei? That’s a debatable question. In my view, they definitely don’t count, but for the “patriotic thieves” they represent, their words probably should count as Party rhetoric—otherwise, it’d hurt their filthy hearts and rotten lungs. So they count, they count. Adding it all up, even after removing duplicates, the sheer volume of Party rhetoric would be an astronomical figure, wouldn’t it? That’s a lot. As for its vagueness, that’s a given. What’s the Party for? It’s for ruling and controlling people. Party rhetoric is for ruling, controlling, or at least tainting people’s minds. And the human mind isn’t as tangible as how many meals you eat or how many times you shit in a day—it’s ethereal. To deal with that ethereality, Party rhetoric, on the whole, has to be vague. Otherwise, forget whether it achieves the effect of ruling, controlling, or influencing thought—it wouldn’t even hold together. Take the Party’s slogan “Serve the People”—it’s vague as hell. What counts as “the people”? What counts as “serving”? If it weren’t vague, it’d have to be something like “providing actions the Party deems ‘service’ to those the Party recognizes as ‘the people.’” See? Even that doesn’t fully clarify “people” or “service.” Tell me, isn’t Party rhetoric vague?
Point Two: The Party’s Rhetoric Is Chaotic and Ever-Changing
Maybe the Party is just too great, or maybe it’s too confident. Within its sphere of control—and even beyond it, in the world it doesn’t rule, as long as it’s related—the Party has something to say about everything. Politics? The Party has words. Economics? The Party has words. Culture? History? Religion? The environment? Even whether humans fuck or have kids—the Party has words. It’s as if the world only has meaning with the Party, and only Party rhetoric can point the way forward. Let’s not even discuss whether it’s right or wrong for now—just ask: with the Party covering every damn thing without exception, how could its rhetoric not be chaotic? It’d be weird if it weren’t! Sure, if Party rhetoric were as precise as legal statutes, such all-encompassing coverage might be justifiable to some extent. But no matter how much the Party boasts, it’s not the law—above the law, maybe, but not the law. And if Party rhetoric were as stable and consistent as benevolent religious doctrine, it might be acceptable from certain angles. But how could it be? The Party Constitution changes constantly, Party leaders at all levels come and go, and even those “patriotic thief” representatives sprout up like weeds after a dung shower—each batch more wicked than the last, each with its own brand of rottenness. And even on the same issue, Party rhetoric can flip-flop in a matter of days. Take the “rat head or duck neck” fiasco from a while back: one day, the Party says it’s a duck neck, and anyone who calls it a rat head should be arrested. The next day, it’s a rat head, and anyone mentioning duck necks is up to no good. If the Party switches back to duck neck on day three, it’s a duck neck—and anyone who dares cling to the issue can be locked up. It’s a small thing, but it perfectly shows how chaotic Party rhetoric is—chaotic enough to fuss over duck necks and rat heads—and how it can change in days or even minutes.
Point Three: The Party’s Rhetoric Is Beautiful, but It Stinks
As I’ve said, Party rhetoric is for ruling, controlling, or at least tainting people’s minds. To go further, it’s for deception—deceiving themselves, their own people, and even more so everyone else who isn’t one of them. Generally, deceptive words sound pretty, and in that sense, Party rhetoric is the prettiest pile of lies out there. It paints a past with almost no mistakes, even if it directly killed tens of millions. It paints a present with almost no problems, even if life under its rule is wretched and suicides are rampant. It paints a future that’s absolutely perfect, even if it’s just a flag waving in the void. That’s how beautiful it is. On another level, Party rhetoric can make fools happy, swindlers comfortable, and those “patriotic thief” representatives climax on the spot—that’s how beautiful it is. On yet another level, the Party doesn’t care whether anyone, including its own people, believes it—just whether they obey. If you obey, fine. If not, they’ll arrest you if they can, or block and twist you if they can’t. With all that, how could Party rhetoric not be beautiful? It’s just that beautiful. But no matter how beautiful it is, it can’t change the fact that it’s a lie—or rather, its stinking essence. Take the Party Constitution’s line: “The Party’s highest ideal and ultimate goal is to realize communism.” Bullshit. If anyone can explain in plain human language what “communism” means or why it’d still matter on the day it’s “realized,” I’ll pray for them every day. If no one—not even those garbage “patriotic thief” representatives—can offer a rational explanation, it just proves that line stinks to high heaven. And if the Party’s highest ideal and ultimate goal reek, can the rest of its rhetoric smell any better?
Having roughly summed up the three traits of Party rhetoric, let’s move on to “being a decent human being.” Strictly speaking, I’m probably an outsider to this too. I’ve done too little, made too many mistakes, and I’m not even sure if what I’m doing now counts as “being decent.” But I’ll keep going anyway, because at least I’m confident in my ability to judge what counts as “being decent.” In my shallow understanding, “being a decent human being” is the same as “being human.” And as for what makes a good human, I think the Confucian virtues of “benevolence, wisdom, propriety, righteousness, and trust” sum it up best. I’m not sure if, in pre-Communist traditional culture, these five words were the minimum requirement or the highest standard for being human. But I’m damn sure that in the Communist Party’s world, they’re as distant and blurry as flowers in a mirror or the moon in water—for almost everyone, including me. The harsher reality is that the louder someone shouts these five words, the further they are from their essence. The biggest reason, I think, is the hypocrisy and treachery inherent in communism and the Communist Party—it’s inevitable, and there’s no way around it. In such a reality, expecting Party people to restrain themselves with “benevolence, wisdom, propriety, righteousness, and trust” is as absurd as asking a sow to climb a tree or a boar to give birth. So let’s toss those five words aside and talk about “being human” or “being decent” after listening to the Party. I think in any era, anywhere, if someone wants to be decent, they should at least be sincere in thought, consistent in logic, and have a moral baseline in behavior. That’s the lowest standard possible. But given the three traits of Party rhetoric I’ve described, and the well-known reality, if you truly listen to the Party, you simply can’t be decent.
Think about it: Party rhetoric is vast and vague. If someone really listens—whether they take it all in (impossible) or pick and choose—they can’t be sincere, at least not in thought. They’d basically be a liar, deceiving themselves and others, at minimum a mental liar. Think about it: Party rhetoric is chaotic and ever-changing. If someone really listens—whether to the big picture (impossible) or the details—they can’t be consistent, at least not in logic. They’d basically be a chameleon, shifting with the wind, at minimum a logical chameleon. Think about it: Party rhetoric is beautiful but stinks. If someone really listens—whether they truly believe (impossible) or fake it—they won’t have many boundaries, at least not in behavior. If you can smell perfume in shit, what’s good or evil, right or wrong, or even humanity? Toss it all out, and without those restraints, why bother with a baseline? What would the world become? Probably the hellhole we’ve got now. And with “patriotic thief” representatives like Hu Xijin, Jin Canrong, Sima Nan, and Zhang Weiwei leading the charge, it can get worse—or rather, it’s already on its way there.
This little essay is pretty much done here, having argued that “listening to the Party and being a decent human being truly leaves you with only one choice.” But after all this back-and-forth, it feels like I might be arguing a false proposition—or at least one with two big flaws. First, in my zeal to jab and poke, I might’ve gone too far. What I really oppose is the Communist Party as a whole and those “patriotic thief” representatives—not necessarily every single Party listener. Second, strictly speaking, “listening to the Party” is more of a spectrum than a fixed standard. For Party people, there’s no one who doesn’t listen at all, nor anyone who listens completely (not even those “patriotic thief” representatives, though they’d love to). So a better phrasing might be: “For Party people, the more you listen to the Party, the less decent you become.” But then I think: any normal person who just ponders the vibe of Party-era terms like “malicious homecoming,” “malicious wage demands,” or “soft underbelly” would probably agree that saying “listening to the Party and being decent are a binary choice” isn’t too far off.
At the end of this essay, I’d like to add one more point. I think the Party knows that even among its own people, there’s no one who doesn’t listen at all or listens completely. So why does it hold “listening to the Party” up so high? Because the Party knows even better that it’s a sharp butcher’s knife hanging over everyone—outsiders and its own people alike—a knife that can chop whoever it wants, whenever it wants. That’s all I’ve got to say.
July 18, 2023, Tuesday
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